A Tie, Tie, Thai, Ties, and TongueTied
by beatgoeson654
Summary: One-shots about partnership, love, crispy noodles, and life. Update: I couldn't leave PitSotW alone, so here's my knee-jerk-reaction-chapter.
1. A Tie

_A Tie_

**Summary: A little B&B Banter (because who doesn't love alliterations, eh?) about who is luckier to have whom as a partner.**

He ran his hands over the closing paragraph of her latest novel and smiled at the implicit innuendo that would eventually lead to the obligatory fade-to-black sex scene.

He made to snap the book closed, but first flipped back to the dedication page to view his name once again.

_This book is dedicated to my partner and friend, Special Agent Seeley Booth._

It had come as a shock to him in the first book in which this dedication had appeared. Now it wasn't so much a shock but a comforting reminder that she cared about him too. The alpha male in him appreciated it too; in some vague anthropological way, he realized, she was staking her claim on him while acknowledging that he had some sort of claim on her. He bet that she would laugh if she heard this hypothesis of his, but it made perfect sense to him, even if his botched anthropological analysis made a mockery of her profession.

He set the book down on his desk, glancing cursorily at the clock as he did so. It was just past 5. If he waited a little while he could drive down to the Jeffersonian and harangue her for not having eaten all day. He was sure she hadn't. Some fresh new rotted corpse had been shipped in from somewhere he couldn't pronounce, which was sure to mean she had spent the majority of her day hunched over a lab table peering at some long-dead soul, reading the minutia of its structure even more thoroughly than he had just read her last novel.

She would give this person an identity. Angela would give it a face. They would recognize this pile of bones for what it was, or once had been – a human being. Those outside their line of work could never fully understand how they could do the jobs that they do… dealing with death all the time. Admittedly, upon first meeting her he had dismissed her as a squint with two feet in other peoples' graves, poking and prodding and scrutinizing them in death. He had realized later that this couldn't be further from the truth. They gave her bodies, she gave them life in the sense that she returned them to those who loved them and made sure their stories were finally told.

That's what she was – a storyteller. People who met her were often confused by the juxtaposition of her strange demeanour and remarkable writing abilities. They simply couldn't see it. How could someone so out of touch with the average human write literary fodder for the masses… and have them completely eat it up?

He'd have to ask her sometime... he began to shut down his computer in preparation to leave for the day. He stood up and was just pushing that accursed desk chair in behind his desk when someone knocked on his door. Assuming it to be Charlie or Danny or – God forbid – Sweets, he told the knocker to come in without a single glance up.

"Am I… disturbing you, Booth?" a wide smile stole over his features as he looked over to see his partner.

"No, Bones. Come in, sit down, make yourself at home,"

She seemed to relax a little, sitting in one of the chairs facing the desk. Her eyes scanned over his cluttered desk, stopping on a familiar object. She picked it up, "Were you reading my book?" she looked at him with a hint of laughter in her eyes, "They really aren't working you hard enough, are they?"

"Well, I don't really have as much work to do when people aren't being murdered left and right. I had a little downtime and I really do enjoy your books," he hesitated, "I know you like to pretend you're _all_ science_, _but you really are an excellent writer."

She looked a little befuddled at the compliment, but stared at the book in her hands and then replied, "I've thought about that actually. The truth is, there's a science to writing."

He laughed teasingly, "Only you, Bones, could take the expression and freedom of language and reduce it to facts and statistics."

She looked at him curiously; he could tell she wasn't offended, "Well, maybe 'science' wasn't the right word. I just approach it as such because that's what I know. The truth is, skilful writing isn't just finding words and putting them in order… it's choosing the perfect words and making them do your bidding to say exactly what you want to say – to convey your exact thoughts in a medium that shows them for precisely what they are – imagination splashed onto a page," she stopped. He stared at her intently until she continued, "There are hundreds of thousands of words and infinite permutations…" her speech was enthusiastic, her face faintly flushed, "but if I don't stop and dwell on all the never-ending options and just simply… feel it, I can write anything I can dream up," she looked at him for the first time, "Brain in neutral, heart in overdrive."

He nodded, too enraptured to do anything else, "There is so much more to you than people realize."

She cocked her head at him, recapturing her businesslike manner with remarkable speed, "And more to you than you allow people to realize. We've all got aspects of our personalities that we don't employ in everyday life. I rarely use my bestselling-novel-writing skills when we solve cases,"

He smiled and shook his head, "True, Bones, but what makes your writing great is your passion. You throw that into everything you do, and that's why you're such an amazing… everything… be it scientist, author, person, or… friend," she blushed again and they sat there in comfortable silence for a few minutes. He got up and grabbed his jacket, stopping behind her, "I'm lucky to have you for a partner, Bones. And all those other things too."

She turned to him and smiled as she made her way through the office door. As he was locking it behind her, "I would say the same to you, Booth."

He tilted his head, charm-smile firmly in place as they made their way to the elevator, "So the question becomes, who is luckier?"

She rolled her eyes at the hand placed on her lower back for the simple motion of guiding her into the elevator, but stopped short of batting it away, "I'll admit that while your alpha-male tendencies tend to annoy me in everyday situations, they come in useful when we need to take down a criminal."

"And I'll admit that while your squint-speak tends to annoy **me **in **every** situation, it is an indispensable part of how we work to our," He paused, remembering how his overuse of the phrase irked her, "_full symbiotic potential_."

She reacted just as he'd known she would, and the elevator doors opened on her exasperated look and his ingratiating but endearing little smirk.

"So it seems," she glanced at him as he spoke, her icy façade beginning to crack a little, "that we have reached an impasse."

She raised an eyebrow, "It seems we have."

"I say I'm luckier."

"I say you are too."

He stopped, staggered for a moment before realising that this was one of those rare and precious instances of Bones-humour, and jogged to catch back up with her, slinging his arm casually across her shoulder this time.

"Maybe," she looked at him sideways, "it's a tie."

He laughed and squeezed her shoulder, "If you say so. A tie. Stalemate. A draw. Dead heat! This is an equal partnership and we are both equally invaluable."

"So that means I get to drive fifty percent of the time?"

"Not a chance, Bones," He held the door open for her and they walked out into the courtyard, all but blind for the blazing sunset, "not a chance."

**Just a short l****ittle friendship piece. **

**Up next: "Tie." Booth gets dressed, with a little help from his partner.**


	2. Tie

Tie

**Summary: Brennan helps Booth get dressed.**

The night was silent but for the impatient tapping of her foot outside his door. She heard him approaching on the other side of the door and crossed her arms in front of her chest.

He swung open the door, its wooden arc bringing in the scent of her hair and the perfume on her skin. He inhaled gratifyingly and smiled.

He was vaguely aware of her speaking, her tone chastising and anxious. Her hair was curled in soft waves to her shoulders and her midnight blue dress was the darker version of her eyes, and just as beautiful. When he finally caught up to reality, he was aware that she was asking him a question, "Why aren't you dressed yet? Booth… are you even listening?"

"No," he answered truthfully, and she passed through the doorway, heels clicking softly on the floor.

Her eyes flashed, but they were too pressed for time for her to ream him out, which he so clearly deserved. Her eyes raked over his Phillies t-shirt and jeans with genuine displeasure.

"We're going to be late. You need to go get dressed."

He smiled sheepishly, "Bones, do we really have to go to this thing? We could stay here, order some take-out… the flyers are playing the devils tonight," we waggled his eyebrows and gave her a winning smile.

"I don't know what that means, Booth, but we have to go," she was dreading it as much as he was, but she couldn't let him see that or it would be even harder to get him out the door.

Tonight was the biggest fundraising event of the year for the Jeffersonian and Brennan needed to rub elbows with philanthropists and powerful men from the Hill.

It wasn't her idea of a good time.

"Hockey, Bones," he was saying, shaking his head exasperatedly, and she pried his fingers off of the doorknob to begin dragging him towards his bedroom.

"What?" she asked, her eyes suddenly concerned, "You just winced."

He shrugged, "sprained my finger earlier, I think," he glanced at her with amusement painted all over his face, "Wow, Bones. Usually when women are trying to get me into this room, it's not to put _more_ clothes _on _me."

She rolled her eyes, shoving him the rest of the way into his room, "Just hurry, please,"

He disappeared through the doorway and her eyes roamed around his living room. She tried to push from her mind the memory of the last time she was there and dressed so formally… the audio of the Gravedigger's call was permanently ingrained on her mind, resounding through the caverns of her cerebrum when she least expected it, like some infernal record player.

She successfully stifled the desire to check and make sure Booth was still around the corner, but it was still there, thrumming in her chest beneath the surface. In a moment, the partner in question emerged from the room, suit jacket flung over his arm and a remarkably unremarkable tie in his other hand.

He looked at her for approval and she responded by tapping her foot a little louder on the hardwood. He held out his hands in a pacifying gesture and proceeded to don his jacket.

Her gaze softened a little as she watched him attempting to tie his dreary black tie into a passable knot. She observed for nearly a minute, growing evermore impatient before she finally strode over him, "here, let me. Judging by the restrictions on your movement, there's microtearing of the ligament tissue between your distal phalange and corresponding metatarsal," he raised his eyebrows, "you'll be fine, but it'll be quicker if I just do it,"

His mouth opened a little in protest, but she smelled so good, and up close she looked even more beautiful than he'd previously noticed. And every few seconds, one of her fingers might accidentally brush across his chest, ever-so lightly. A silly grin came over his face, and he hoped she hadn't noticed but she had. She smiled a little herself. But he couldn't stop looking at her, and nor did he want to.

This complicated things. A flustered Brennan was also having a reasonable amount of difficulty with the knot now, "Here," she offered, steering him in front of a mirror. "I can't tie it if I'm facing you; it's all backwards. This might work better."

She circled him and he gulped. Inaudibly, he hoped. He was just preparing himself for what would come next. She reached around him to tie it, up on her toes, her forearms resting lightly on his shoulders and her face looking over him and into her work in the mirror.

He could feel her breath on the side of his neck by his left ear. His chest got a little tighter. He was looking everywhere but her face in the mirror. He tried to focus on her hands but then he started thinking about her hands and… okay, this wasn't going to work. Maybe he could just close his eyes. But then… no, this was even worse. He wished he could kick his own imagination's ass so it would stop messing with him. He opened his eyes cautiously and saw that she was on the last step of the knot.

He reached up out of habit to pull it tight and his hands were suddenly grasping hers as they both went for the same spot to finish the job.

Reflexively, he turned his head to look at her. Bigger mistake. He had underestimated how close she was. He would find that funny later… _Objects in mirror are closer than they appear._ But for right now, there were no thoughts in his head… just… her. Staring back at him from so very close.

It was one of those wonderfully-dangerous, dangerously-wonderful, electric moments. Her mouth opened in surprise and he was forgetting to breathe. She fell back onto her heels with a faint click, never breaking eye contact. He turned around slowly with the air of someone trying not to scare away an untamed animal, also never letting his eyes drop.

Now he was facing her and she was completely at a loss, still loosely grasping his tie with his hands placed over hers.

The seconds ticked by and Booth hoped she couldn't read the expression in eyes as well as she read the minutia of bones. She was looking to him… through him… into him. He slowly removed his hands from hers, hesitating for a moment with them over her shoulders, then deciding against it, dropping them to his sides.

"_Do something…"_ she thought, "_Come on, Temperance… do something."_

She resolved to do what she saw as the only option… she pulled on the length of the tie in her hand, in order to complete the knot.

What happened next they would argue about hours later, as she pulled the tie off over his head and he pinned her up against the wall by that very same mirror, planting slow, sweet kisses down her neck. When you pull on someone's tie, there's always the chance that they will come with it, right? He would always take this stance in the years that followed. She would counter with no, not if he was expecting it.

But they would always agree on one thing: they were both glad that he had.

She went to complete the double Windsor, pulling on the thicker portion of the tie, and inadvertently (or, quite possibly, on-purpose) pulled his lips to hers.

They arrived at the gala _almost _on time, her hair slightly mussed from his passionate embrace and his lapels faintly wrinkled from her grasping hands.

But everything else was perfect, from their identical, blissful grins to their intertwined fingers and the careful, loving knot of his plain black tie.

**I don't know about you guys, but I keep waiting for something like that to happen every time she grabs his tie on the show, which happens a lot. Come on, writers... COME ON! **

**Review? =)**

**Up next: Mmm, Thai food with a side of friendship fluff.**


	3. Thai

Thai

**Summary: **Brennan's ruminations at the end of the workday. Set sometime in season 4 (pre-Michelle, pre-Roxie/Angela breakup).

Temperance Brennan was done working for the day.

It was something rare. Something… not really ever seen by human eyes. She leaned against the railing of the lounge and watched her co-workers leave to go home for the night.

Cam left first, around half-past five. She could leave whenever she wanted; she was the boss. But Brennan supposed it was unfair to judge her for this; Cam was a capable administrator, and apart from that it was obvious that she really cared about the team. She ruminated for a moment on what Cam would go home to. She wasn't sure if she had anyone to go home to… it dawned on her that she knew very little about the personal life of her immediate superior. She'd never asked, she supposed.

Hodgins and Angela left around the same time, a vestigial habit of their long-gone love affair. Brennan wondered if they ever met on their way to their respective vehicles, whether accidentally or otherwise.

Angela would go home to Roxie, though not to one domicile that they cohabited, because Roxie had denied her request that they move-in together. Hodgins would go home to his empty mansion, passing the garage, besieged by memories of its former inhabitant. The thought made Brennan feel an upsurge of affection and sympathy for the _bugs'n'slime_ guy. She knew how she felt to have a void left by the betrayal of a loved one. She knew it several times over.

The building continued to empty and she stayed stationary from her perch overlooking the platform. If anyone asked, Brennan wouldn't be able to tell them why she was still hanging around the office; she had identified her last remains nearly an hour ago. She was waiting for something. She wasn't consciously aware of what this thing was, but she somehow just knew it was coming.

The last other employee of the Jeffersonian medico-legal lab made his way through the doors to the exit, glancing at the enigmatic author as he did so. Three years ago, the sight would have saddened him, but he knew better now. Lonely as she may have looked, there was a hole in her life that had been filled with Som Tum and partnership and fried rice and love. He smiled as the FBI agent passed him going in the other direction, clutching paper bags of crispy noodles and companionship.

She smelled the mee krob and pad thai faintly at first, and at first heard no sign of her partner approaching. She wondered vaguely if it simply was a misfiring of neurons before whirling around to see her partner, grinning that familiar grin.

"You shouldn't sneak up on people like that," she chided, "As a former sniper, you have an unfair advantage,"

He bowed his head in mock apology, "My deepest regrets, madam," he held the bags out to her and gestured her to the nearest couch, "I come bearing gifts,"

She settled down on the couch next to him and pulled the nearest carton towards her, relaxing into the cushions in a manner so complete she never would have thought it possible before she met him. Her mind flashed back to her colleagues' departure into their own lives and realized that her life was sitting next to her, and she'd never felt so fully complete and less alone. There was more to it than this, of course, but it was a good metaphor. Thai was her favourite food. Thai never let her down. He was her favourite person who never let her down, and for the time being, there was no place in the world she'd rather be, and quite honestly nothing she'd rather be eating.

She broke her chopsticks and sighed contentedly as she viewed her partner through a sidelong glance.

He caught her contagious smile and inquired, "what are you smiling about, Bones?"

She simply shrugged, holding his eyes for a moment before returning to her dinner, "I like Thai."

**Don't you just love them? Review SVP! =)**

**Up next: last one, more Brennanthoughts, this time on the recent changes in her life and all of its newfound interconnections with those around her.**


	4. Tied

Tied

**Summary: More of Brennan's musings, this time as she wrote closing paragraph of the story of Booth's coma dream.**

**Note: I'm sorry it took so long to post this! Midterms and life got in the way. Thanks for everyone who reviewed or added it to their alerts, the constant stream of emails reminded me that I had unresolved business here on ffnet. Anyway, this is the last one, I hope you enjoy. Oh, and sorry it's so short. Unless you hate it, in which case... just "sorry".**

Temperance Brennan had always appreciated her freedom. She thrived on the knowledge that she was an independent woman who could live her life as she pleased, no strings attached, nothing holding her down anywhere.

This lifestyle had begun after her parents had left and Russ had abandoned her. She was shunted from house to house, always run by people with whom she had no real connection. She lived life in a haphazard manner, secure in the fact that she could, at any moment, go anywhere, do anything, and not disappoint or worry anyone, because she knew deep down that there was no one in her life who really cared about her.

Now was different.

For the first time in almost two decades, she had somewhere that she belonged, people to whom she belonged and who belonged to her - a family. Something she couldn't just get up and walk away from, though she still felt the need to flee every so often, and jetted off to Central America whenever things became too much.

There she would return to her anthropological roots and lose herself in work for a little while, but now there was something pulling her back. People, a calling, a career, relationships, and ties she couldn't sever. As much as she might have hated to admit how much a single person could affect her entire life course, the primary reason that she was irrevocably anchored to DC and the Jeffersonian was Booth. Their partnership was the strongest tie of all, and it derived its strength from understanding, compassion, and hitherto unrecognized yet undoubtedly true love. Brennan herself wasn't aware how inextricably linked they actually were, though she had caught a glimpse during his fake death, and was petrified by this realization.

Despite all of this, instead of feeling tied down in the sense of being trapped and constricted, she felt… secure, safe, comfortable. Part of her, the old Brennan, still felt vulnerable in that it knew that the ties which bind us to those we love are the only things that can truly tear us apart.

But she had evolved. She had glimpsed what life could be like with true, human connection, and it was worth it all. She could fear abandonment and disappointment but still cherish every second of friendship, camaraderie, and love.

These thoughts ran through her head as she watched Booth from the chair next to his hospital bed. She smiled slightly as she penned the last paragraph of her story.

"You love someone, you open yourself up suffering, that's the sad truth. Maybe they'll break your heart, maybe you'll break their heart and never be able to look at yourself in the same way. Those are the risks. That's the burden. Like wings they have weight, we feel that weight on our backs, but they are a burden that lifts us. Burdens which allow us to fly..."

She murmured the words as she wrote them, and even though she obliterated them a few moments later, they stuck with her for weeks afterward as she crashed through the jungles of Guatemala until the ties that bound her to him pulled her back home once more. In a paradoxical way that flew in the face of her beloved logic, these so-called burdens lifted her, and these ties had really set her free: free to realize happiness, free to have her life fulfilled and enriched by others, free to love and be loved, and free to realize that she really wouldn't want it any other way.

**C'est fini! hope you enjoyed my one-shots. I couldn't come up with any other homophones or uses for the word, but believe me, I tried. (if you have any suggestions, let me know; I might have one more in me.)**


	5. TongueTied

**Tongue-Tied**

**Author's Note: I can't believe that just happened. I probably haven't given this nearly enough time to settle, but I had to put some words down.**

**The Mother-of-all-Spoiler-Alerts for 5x16.**

"You're the gambler."

Sweets words had shot through him and hit home like nothing before them. He sat stone still, giving no impression that they had made any on him at all. He felt her glance more than he saw it. His heart was racing.

"Something to eat?" he was nonchalant. He wasn't hungry. His stomach was anything but empty; it was tied in a knot.

She jumped at the chance and just like that, they were gone. Sweets sunk back in his chair, crushed. As he had every right to feel. It was a professional and personal humiliating defeat. In reality, nothing had changed, but to Sweets, absolutely everything looked different.

--

He was the gambler. He tried to make small talk, but it was no use. As inevitable as this had all seemed before, it was now inescapable. The decision had already been made. His hands were tied. He looked her in the eyes.

"I'm the gambler."

One rainy night, 6 years previously, he had swept his gambling addiction aside as if it were the easiest thing in the world. It had been displaced, replaced. The void he had previously filled with late night pool wagers and poker games and off-track bets seemed to no longer exist. And if it did, it was full. Full of her.

That night, he had felt it. He knew. This night, he gambled for the first time in six years. And lost.

For several glorious seconds, their lips touched and he held her to him. She pushed him away.

And she told him she couldn't change. He pled his case. His words came easily and she could tell he'd given it thought. Apparently he'd been thinking for over half a decade. Weighing the odds, always folding, waiting for pocket aces.

This was it; he was all in.

He kept his silence as she dissected his dream with the precision of the brilliant scientist she was. "Don't look so sad," she pleaded.

"Everything happens eventually" now seemed as foolish to him as it once had to her. The longest silence yet hung in the air after her question. Could they still work together?

He was tongue-tied. It took him too long to answer and he knew she noticed. And even as he reassured her that they could and they walked away, he still didn't know.

He had gambled his world upside down for what? For a dream. A dream he felt he deserved, a dream he couldn't live without, but a dream nonetheless.

Because, like love, addictions are so much stronger than one gives them credit for. Booth had been addicted to gambling. Addicted to Bones. Addicted to dreaming.

With the resolve of a wounded soldier, he quit all three, cold turkey. In the interest of self-preservation, he abandoned his dream.

"_Nothing happens unless first a dream."_


End file.
